May 2013 Archive

Too many marketing leaders still lump tablets and smartphones into the same mobile bucket. That’s a mistake. Why? Because tablets are not primarily mobile devices. Instead, they are mostly used within the home. Marketing leaders must create a differentiated tablet experience or risk dissatisfying their best customers and missing opportunities to engage when customers discover and explore their products.

Here are the key takeaways from new research I conducted in the past few months:

Tablet marketing matters. Tablet marketing enables marketers to engage with influential customers who spend less time on PCs and print media. People use tablets differently from smartphones, requiring marketers to adapt their approach.

Marketers should use tablets to enhance discovery and depth in the digital home. Marketers will see the benefits of designing immersive tablet experiences for people discovering and researching their brands and products. They should use search marketing to drive better conversion rates and tablet commerce. And they should maximize TV ads by creating tablet extensions for multitaskers as well as creating new marketing experiences in the digital home.

Shift to contextual marketing. Most of us have only had mobile phones for, at most, 12 years. I have already explained here why we’re all mobile teens, figuring out our relationships with others and with brands. Unsurprisingly, marketers face challenges integrating mobile and tablet in the mix. It’s time to stop thinking about devices and instead shift to thinking about contextual marketing.